Required reading.

The Giving Tree

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drstrangelov said:
It turns your all American high school student into a jaded know it all in a few hundred pages. Those kids proselytize like crazy too.
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It didn't do that to me. Any literature can make a young person think they're a know it all.
 
HomerThompson said:
It didn't do that to me. Any literature can make a young person think they're a know it all.
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I'm not implying that al of these books automatically create zealots. just noting that in life, these books will make serious impressions on people, I think everyone would be wise to get acquainted with the material.
 
nostradumbass said:
Yeah, I prolly agree with that, but I don't think Book of Mormon or Dianetics have had much impact on anything.

Did you read "Atlas Shrugged"? Ayn Rand was a really bad writer and she took like 1000 pages to get done what could have been done in like 200. That was a hard book to get through. If you're going to read a 900 page book, I'd rather someone read the Brothers Karamazov than Atlas Shrugged.

I used to be friends with Howard Zinn's cousin. She's an older lady and was so proud of his writing, but I think the guy is a total idiot. He actually said to Dennis Prager once that he doesn't think the world would be better off if America never existed.
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If you've never met fully committed Mormon or Scientology recruiters, good for you. Both books can have a big impact on people. I'm not saying I'd read any of these for entertainment, but as some homework for an enlightened life, I think it's worth knowing the stuff that drives people into strong, lasting beliefs.
 
Rex Kwon Do said:
I haven't. I've heard it's poorly written, tedious and incoherent. However it is on my "to read" list.
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It's short, so not a major undertaking to read it, but yeah, it's not well-written, but I don't speak German well enough to have read the original version.

As far as translations go, I do things completely wrong. I read all of Michel Huelbecq's book in English, and all of Cormac McCarthy's books in French. I just bought a pile of them in a small bookstore in France a few years ago, and I'm embarrassed to say "The Road" was called "La Route" and had the movie poster as the front cover.
 
drstrangelov said:
I'm not implying that al of these books automatically create zealots. just noting that in life, these books will make serious impressions on people, I think everyone would be wise to get acquainted with the material.
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Well, yeah. People are stupid and easily influenced. Like how Chapman read The Catcher in the Rye and automatically thought he was supposed to kill John Lennon and all the phonies.
 
drstrangelov said:
If you've never met fully committed Mormon or Scientology recruiters, good for you. Both books can have a big impact on people. I'm not saying I'd read any of these for entertainment, but as some homework for an enlightened life, I think it's worth knowing the stuff that drives people into strong, lasting beliefs.
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Oh, I definitely have. They used to hit me up outside my college gym and invite me to ice cream socials. Not Scientology though. I don't think they're really even a thing outside Florida and California.

Mormon's are actually a little scarier, cause when you meet them, you just think "what a nice person". Like nobody is poor or fat in the entire religion.
 
nostradumbass said:
Oh, I definitely have. They used to hit me up outside my college gym and invite me to ice cream socials. Not Scientology though. I don't think they're really even a thing outside Florida and California.
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They're very prevalent in Cambridge Massachusetts. You'll always see them around Harvard. Interestingly, so is the LDS, I was exposed to a lot of these people growing up. It's a little creepy.
 
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drstrangelov said:
They're very prevalent in Cambridge Massachusetts. You'll always see them around Harvard. Interestingly, so is the LDC, I was exposed to a lot of these people growing up. It's a little creepy.
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They're wrong, but it seems to be working out for them.

lol, I just realized that all the religious people I know kind of gave up their religion. The Muslim's I knew are all atheists now, and so is my Mormon friend. Both my sisters are still Christians, but their husbands are ministers, so let's keep that the way it is, and my fiance is a pretty devout Christian who's family has told her they think I'm a better person than any of the Christians she dated before me.
 
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freaky said:
Get that religion bible crap out of here. Nobody needs to read that shit.

Should read it like fiction and not as non-fiction.

Fable books that teach morals are good.
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Why could you not read the bible as a fable book? That's exactly what it is. Yeah, read it as fiction, I never said you should read it as an historical account of anything. It's had like almost 2,000 years of revisions, how could it not be a great book?
 
As great and influential as Hemingway is, I would put either Dickens or Tolstoy above him on the "must read" list.

I've read some Hemingway to an ex, and she didn't even appreciate it. His style has been so widely copied that most modern fiction is a poor imitation of it. I'm afraid it lost some of its power for the average reader.
 
I've always been partial to Chinese literature.

Romance of the Three Kingdoms is my all time favorite. I prefer the Moss Roberts translation.

I think Sun Tzu's Art of War is definitely required reading and it's so short!
 
Rational Poster said:
I've always been partial to Chinese literature.

Romance of the Three Kingdoms is my all time favorite. I prefer the Moss Roberts translation.

I think Sun Tzu's Art of War is definitely required reading and it's so short!
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Wouldn't disagree with "Art of War". I guess "Romance of the Three Kingdoms" is pretty valuable, but we gotta keep the list kinda short. I'd take old school Russian over Chinese I think. Brothers Karamozov and "War and Peace" I think are better. If you can read both, by all means, do it, but if you only have time for 1, I'd take Tolstoy or Dostoevsky over the Chinese writers.
 
nostradumbass said:
Wouldn't disagree with "Art of War". I guess "Romance of the Three Kingdoms" is pretty valuable, but we gotta keep the list kinda short. I'd take old school Russian over Chinese I think. Brothers Karamozov and "War and Peace" I think are better. If you can read both, by all means, do it, but if you only have time for 1, I'd take Tolstoy or Dostoevsky over the Chinese writers.
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I think the Chinese classics are valuable because they're so old.

Not that the Russian writers are bad, and if anything they're much easier and entertaining reads. They're just much more contemporary.
 
Rational Poster said:
I think the Chinese classics are valuable because they're so old.

Not that the Russian writers are bad, and if anything they're much easier and entertaining reads. They're just much more contemporary.
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I always just called "Art of War" a pamphlet. The Brothers Karamozov is a really long book, but I've read it like 5 times because I think it is just that good.
 
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